beef

The first cookbooks I bought after I left my parental home were a strange mix: Chinese food, Indian food and a book about cooking food with a microwave.
Having learned the staples of our Dominican cuisine at my mother’s side, I was ready to explore something new. Needless to say, for a while my roommates had to endure my ...

Finishing this Minced Beef with Vegetables before my daughter returned from school brought to my mind a conversation we had about a year ago, possibly after the umpteenth time I told her to either not waste food, or to turn off the lights when she left a room. You know, the same things our mothers ...

Nearly two centuries ago a wave of immigrants from the former Ottoman Empire found its way to America (the continent), fleeing persecution and economic hardship. With them they brought bits and pieces of the rich cuisines from a territory that surrounded most of the Mediterranean, and the Red and Black seas.
Kipe / quipe, as we Dominicans ...

Tis' the season for soup, fa lala lala la! Let's start it with this Pressure Cooker Beef Stew with Red Wine.
This is my favorite part of the year, and I wished it lasted for 11 months. It has nothing to do with carols, shiny lights or gifts. It's all about the weather, crazy as that ...

A few years back, as part of an advertisement campaign, a certain local company had a funny commercial in which a newlywed husband called his wife on his way home to ask what she was cooking for supper. We never see the wife, but the husband gleefully repeats what she says:
- "Pastelón de arroz?!"
The following ...

Locavores are those who are part of a global movement that proposes the consumption of locally-grown food. It's a movement fueled by concerns about the environment and the nutritional quality of food that has travelled from afar, and subjected to diverse methods of preservation.
As with anything, there are several sides to this argument.
As with any non-centralized movement, ...

It was love at first sight with Mr. Queso de Hoja, the cheese vendor, whose, uh, balls of cheese were always the freshest…
Oh, how I miss the street vendors. All vendors really, but in particular, and in no small part due to their multitude, the food vendors, of course. The travelling hair accessories guy is ...

We once took a poll amongst our readers called "Mondongo: Yucky or Yummy?", which sparked in me some reflection. My money was on a landslide victory for the Yuckies. I admit it, I voted more than once, in order to better register my enormous dislike.
The Yuckies lost. By a lot.
For those innocently unaware, "mondongo" is ...

This story started like many others before: with the need to write a recipe and take pictures, and a husband befuddled by the introduction of yet another "suspicious" Dominican dish.
- "Honey, what are you cooking".
- "Something you've never eaten before".
- "I can see that, but, what is it?"
- "Salami guisado"
- "What?!"
- "Why would you do ...

Am I ever glad that I have never called myself an expert on anything. Especially not an expert on Dominican food.
Every time I learn something about food in general, or Dominican food in particular, I'm justly reminded that there is much to learn, and with things changing all the time one never finishes learning. This ...

Confession time: I was sorely tempted to start this post with a tawdry joke about a butcher, a housewife and beef tongue. For this I have nobody to blame but Aunt Ilana's husband, Pedro. Luckily, and for the sake of the children who visit our site, the joke would be lost in translation. Phew!
Will somebody ...

We're not from round here. Kipe is the proof.
One of the things that marvels me about America, the continent, is that for the most part we are all young nations, some more stable and prosperous than others, but we all have one thing in common: short memory. This is well illustrated in Dominican society as ...

Carne ripiada (shredded beef), with some variations, is known throughout Latin America with many different names. The base is an inexpensive cut of beef (flank, for example), cooked over low heat for a long time until it becomes very tender. Some vegetables are also added to the mix.
The Dominican carne ripiada is pretty close to ...

Growing up I thought that nearly everybody made meatballs the same way we did, and although it's not like I've become an expert on meatballs (or anything for that matter), I have found out that our meatballs are uniquely ours.
Thanks to the Viking superstore, masses of Dominicans have tried the world-famous Swedish ones, and yet ...

"Is it because you don't love me anymore?" Ah, my husband, always so funny.
About a decade and a half ago I was trying to find my culinary style. For the first time in my life I was in charge of cooking for someone else, and that someone else turned out to be somebody from a ...

Let me start by warning you that liver is verboten in this home, I even had to wait until my husband was out of the country to test this recipe. Since I needed some "testers" to try this higado encebollado (liver with onions), I drafted Lucas (Aunt Ilana's 10-year old son) and Nadia (my five-year ...

If you, like me, are Dominican, trust me, I do not do say this with any intention to offend, but truth be told: beef is not our forte.
There, it's out in the open.
We tend to overcook beef (there is a reason for that, read on). And as a result we end up with dry, stringy ...

Everybody loves lasagna--even cartoon cats, it seems--and we Dominicans are no exception.
This 3 Cheeses and Beef Lasagna, while insanely flavorful, is not trying to pass itself as an authentic Italian dish; after all, it's not the first time we do unspeakable things to Italian dishes. Unspeakably-delicious things.
One thing I really dislike in many lasagna versions ...

Please sit down and share with me a slice of this juicy Lasagna de Berenjenas (Beef and Eggplant Casserole), and let me tell you about our latest adventure.
A few months back I shared with you our adventures crossing our country from corner to corner: North by Northwest - From PuntaCana to Montecristi. This week we ...

Some time ago I made the distinction between the art and science of different types of food preparation. My basic premise was that cooking was more of an art, whereas baking is more of a science, with certain exceptions to that rule. Something we frequently mention in passing, but have not tackled in depth, is ...

‘Dominicans don't like spicy food’ (Rabo Encendido [Spicy Oxtail Stew] being one exception. I heard that yet again last night from someone who certainly enjoys spicy-hot food, and I agree with her. Unlike our Mexican cousins or our neighbors to the west, Dominicans don’t handle spicy-hot food very well; this is in part a matter ...

Thanks to all those childhood years spent watching imported Mexican television shows, I learned early that cantinas were bars, something to do with moustachioed bandidos with big sombreros drinkingtequila and drawing pistols with lightning-fast speed. Had it not been for these countless hours of, hmm... er, “educational” TV I would have made it to adulthood ...

Mofongo (garlic-flavored mashed plantains), concedes Aunt Clara, is a dish with a special place in the hearts and stomachs of Dominicans, but actually originates in the neighboring island of Puerto Rico.
Not surprisingly, I know some Dominicans who would take serious issue with that claim. Mofongo is the flagship dish in many typical Dominican restaurants ...

When I first moved to the Dominican Republic I stayed with my future mother-in-law for a couple of months. Although I had visited the country several times before and eaten Dominican food at friends' houses, comedores and restaurants, this was my first real immersion in a traditional Dominican household. As a vegetarian I ate more ...

School is about to start, and children everywhere are going to be asked to speak or write about what they did on their holidays. Why should I be any exception?
The difference is that I'm not going to go on at length about what I did, but what I learned.
I spent the first couple of weeks ...

Dominicans love their pastelón de plátano maduro (ripe plantains casserole), which is ironic, because apart from politicians, in this country there is nothing that is more maligned than the plantain.
It’s accused, no less, of being partly responsible for our island’s rampant underdevelopment. It is said to block the brain and stop intelligence from flowing, according to ...

As we all know, a new age of airport security is upon us, as we adjust to the various new stringent measures in place: profiling, nosy questions, long line-ups, and the meat & veggie frisks. The meat & veggie frisks, you ask? Yes, it’s true! 600 kilos of meat are confiscated weekly at DR airports, ...

Someone gave me a deep fat-fryer about a month ago and it sat in my kitchen, ignored, until just last week. I was having such a hard time with the notion of sinking foods into so much hot sizzling oil, tightly contained in a bin-like receptacle plugged into the wall. And my arteries collapsing under ...

Whenever I want to explain Pasteles en Hoja (Roots and Beef Pockets) to somebody who has never seen them I usually say "they are a little bit like tamales, with different ingredients and wrapped in plantain leaves instead of corn husks".
I know it's a roundabout way of explaining it, but it gets the message across. If the ...

Sancocho in the Dominican Republic is synonymous with party.
Dominicans are spontaneous and happy people who do not need much of an excuse to party. Where there are two or more Dominicans, a party may break out at any moment; some occasions, however, call for more lavish and elaborate celebrations.
A baptism is an occasion for family ...

A party’s not a party without a picadera – I may have that printed on a t-shirt, seriously -- especially not without Empanaditas and Pastelitos (Savory Turnovers).
My experience with picadera in the DR is that you have to be pretty forceful to get any. If it’s a table laid out with food, you want to ...

Aunt Clara's Kitchen is a collection of traditional Dominican and Dominican-inspired recipes, home ideas, crafts, and the chronicles of the Aunties' adventures.